


Blueberry Pie

by sraye96



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Everybody Lives, Fix-It, Good Parents Maggie & Wentworth Tozier, Insomnia, Internalized Homophobia, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-11
Updated: 2020-02-11
Packaged: 2021-02-28 06:20:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 9,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22659208
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sraye96/pseuds/sraye96
Summary: It ends with blueberry pie. It always ends with blueberry pie, which doesn’t make any sense. Richie doesn’t even like pie. But it’s never stopped him before because it always ends with blueberry pie, especially on his worst days. They represent something bigger than just a dessert, something safe and familiar. It reminds him of someone that he’s pretty sure he loved, or still loves, even if he can’t remember their face.It ends with blueberry pie, but it starts because Richie can't sleep.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier, Richie Tozier/Sandy
Comments: 14
Kudos: 112





	Blueberry Pie

**Author's Note:**

> My lovely fiance, the light of my life, woke me up cooking way too much French onion soup at 5 in the morning for a soup competition at work and this idea was born! I'm actually really happy with how this turned out, even if I did have to be woken up way too early in the goddamn morning for the idea to happen.

It ends with blueberry pie. It always ends with blueberry pie, which doesn’t make any sense. Richie doesn’t even like pie. But it’s never stopped him before because it always ends with blueberry pie, especially on his worst days. They represent something bigger than just a dessert, something safe and familiar. It reminds him of someone that he’s pretty sure he loved, or still loves, even if he can’t remember their face.

It ends with blueberry pie, but it starts because Richie can't sleep. 

He tries, but it doesn't ever seem to take. He closes his eyes and drifts off peacefully around ten every night, but then images of missing posters and mutating clowns and werewolves dancing behind his eyelids almost immediately. He bolts awake, sweaty, heart hammering in his chest, thinking of too many rows of sharp teeth and sliced palms and the terrified looks on each of his best friend's faces. He tries to go back to sleep most nights, but once the idea of the nightmare is there, the shadows of his room warp monsters in their own right and it gets harder to keep his eyes closed when he's surrounded by demons in his head and in his room. It's not every night, but it's at least three times a week since the whole fiasco of the summer of '89. 

So he can't sleep.

But part of the biggest problem of being riddled with sleeping problems and ADHD at the tender age of twelve is that he also can't sit still in the wee hours of the night. The buzzing nervous energy under his skin makes him feel like he should be doing something since he's awake anyway. At first, he tries listening to his mixtapes and reading comics that he had filched off Bill or Eddie, but he runs out of comics quickly and if he listens to his music too loud, he worries about waking up his parents and while he wants something to do, getting yelled at is not it. He tries working on homework next. He doesn't want to do it in the first place, but it’s something to do and that’s better than nothing. It runs out pretty fast too. 

The next time he goes to Stan's, he asks to borrow an old puzzle that his friend has already completed. It's pretty, with hummingbirds of all different colors on it, but it's almost just as boring as doing his homework. It gives his hands something to do, but it's not enough, so his leg bounces the whole time and he completes it in two nights. He returns it shortly after and asks for another one, but he doesn't know if he wants to do it again. It sits on his desk and collects dust. 

He tags along with Ben to the library next time he goes. He likes non-fiction books more than fiction, so Richie ends up browsing the shelves by himself mostly, looking at sci-fi and fantasy books while Ben is in the historical section. He checks out two books, his first ones ever despite having been in and out of the library for years with Stan, Eddie, and Bill, and he takes them home. When he can sit down and focus on the words on the page, it's the perfect distraction from the fact that his clock is ticking away the seconds he should be sleeping. He can't always make himself focus though. He finishes the books in two weeks and goes back for more, but he knows that the solution isn't permanent. He needs something more engaging so he stops bouncing his leg so much. The house creeks and he still worries about waking up his parents. 

Beverly notices the circles under his eyes and calls him out on it one day when they're in the clubhouse together alone. She doesn't have any suggestions to sleep either, but she promises to call on nights she can. About once a week, they end up bent over a phone, whispering so they didn't wake up their parents. Richie starts working on his second puzzle during their calls and finds it's his favorite way to spend the nights if he can't sleep. It’s finally enough to keep his brain, his hands, and his mouth all busy at once. But her dad would kill her if he ever found her on the phone with a boy at one in the morning, so they have to limit how much they do it to avoid getting caught.

Bill talks about writing until the late hours of the night and how it helps him with his nightmares, so Richie tries to take that up. His stories don't make sense and he gets frustrated because the words on the page never sound as good as they do in his head, so he stops writing stories and starts writing down his jokes. He figures one day it might help him, even if the only audience he has now is the captive one in his friends when they're trekking through the Barrens or stuck at the cafeteria during lunch. He likes to think his jokes are getting better, but trying to be funny when everyone is awake and when they're all asleep too wears him down, so he can’t do it every night. 

When Mike can't sleep, he's taken up throwing a football around in the yard of his farm. He decided to work on a perfect spiral, but once he accomplished that, he decided to work on accuracy, so he's got a tire swing he tries to throw the ball through. It gives Richie the idea that if he wears out his body, it'll be easier to sleep, so he tries that. He starts with push ups, but his arms are stretching out like the rest of his body and they're about as strong as noodles. He can't do very many, so he switches to sit ups and then wall sits. It sounded like a good idea initially, but really, he hates gym class for a reason and that reason is he's not in shape. He can't do very much before he's out of breath and sweaty all over again, so it doesn't kill much time. He does it anyway, but he needs something to fill the rest of the time that he's awake, so it's not enough on its own. 

Once the dark rings around his eyes start becoming worse, Eddie starts telling him all the things he needs to try. He rattles off a whole list of things that should help Richie get to sleep, then stay asleep, including vitamins and teas and meditations and breathing exercises. He's been obsessed with reading about health and medications and all those things since he found out his mom had him on placebos, so he’s now the Losers Club resident doctor. He already had been anyway, but at least now he knows what he's talking about more often than not. Richie tries them and some of them help him fall asleep, but nothing keeps the nightmares at bay for very long. He starts to wake up at two or three in the morning instead of midnight or one, so he gets a little bit more sleep. 

Halfway into the first school year post clown, he still can't sleep. One night, after his short exercise, he decides to make himself a snack since he didn't eat much at dinner and that was seven hours ago anyway. Creeping as quietly as he can downstairs, he slaps together a peanut butter and jelly sandwich before hightailing it back to his room with his bounty and a glass full of milk too. He falls back asleep reading his book after finishing his sandwich and he thinks maybe food is the answer. 

He falls into a routine then.Take his vitamins and drinking his tea prescribed by Doctor K at nine, fall asleep around ten, sleep for about three hours, wake up after a nightmare, do his short workout, rinse off, make a sandwich, eat it while he reads or works on his puzzle or talks to Beverly, and then fall back asleep around four or five in the morning, if he manages to fall back asleep at all. It sucks, but he's starting to get used to the headaches from lack of sleep and sometimes he sneaks in naps in the hammock with Eddie in the clubhouse or in the back of classes he's already completed homework for. It could be better, but it's his normal and he's okay with it. The worst part is that he has to be quiet for his parents, so it's all done in near silence, which he can't stand. 

He's thirteen when it changes. After almost a full year of PB&Js, he finally decides he needs something else to eat. His options are limited because he doesn't know how to cook, but he thinks mac and cheese should be easy enough to make quietly. When he gets to the kitchen though, he isn't the only one there. Maggie is sitting at the table, reading the newspaper and sipping a mug of tea. If he gets caught, he's pretty sure he's going to get in trouble so he tries to slip out of the kitchen before she can notice him, but it's too late. The floorboards groan underneath his foot when he turns. 

She looks up, her mug lifted to her face, and her eyes fall on him and he's sure that she's going to get angry when he sees her eyebrow arch high up on her forehead. His dad always makes fun of them for having such expressive eyebrows, but he thinks it's cool that his mom can move both her eyebrows. He's practicing with his left one since he can already move his right. At that moment, her arched eyebrow isn’t cool. It’s terrifying because he knew it's just a matter of time before she gets mad at him for being out of bed. But when she sets her mug down on the table, she turns back to him and her voice is soft. "Hey, Richie. Can't sleep?"

He shakes his head, still ready to bolt if she starts chewing him out. 

She doesn't. Instead, she nods like it makes sense. "Need something to eat?"

His voice is still stuck in his throat, so he nods again. 

"Alright. Want to help me cook? We have some chicken thawed. Or do you want something else?" She asks, standing up with a smile. 

"I, um." He shuffles towards her. "I was going to make mac and cheese."

"You don't know how to cook, Richie." Maggie laughs, ruffling his hair. "Want me to teach you how to make it so you can do it on your own next time?"

He nods again and she begins to pull out all the things she needs. A comfortable silence stretches between them, but he hates it like he hates all silences, so he decides to break it. "You're not mad I'm up?"

"Honey, why would I be mad that you can't sleep? Grab the butter from the fridge." He does as she instructs, placing it next to the skillet she's got on the stove. "I can't sleep either."

"Oh." It makes sense now that he thinks about it, but he was thinking of all those times his parents had gotten onto him when he had snuck out of his room to watch cartoons after they went to bed. Of course he got in trouble for that, he was breaking the rules. There was no rule that he had to be good at sleeping. That would be a stupid rule anyway.

Maggie gives him a soft smile. "I think food helps me sleep most nights. I spend a lot of time in the kitchen too, if you ever need someone to keep you company, sweetie."

"What about Went?" He asks. He's been calling his parents Mags and Went since he found out their real names weren't mom and dad when he was seven, much to their chagrin. Actually, it's mostly to the chagrin of everyone else. His parents never seem to mind all that much; in fact, Maggie's lips curl up a bit higher every time he says it. She always got his humor and Went would shoot back joking jabs almost as fast as Eddie could, but his didn't always make sense like his friend's did. 

"He sleeps like the dead. He snores too, I'm surprised it doesn't keep you up." They share a conspiratorial giggle. "Okay, first you melt the butter in your skillet." 

From there, she starts teaching him how to make the mac and cheese he's eaten his entire life. It's a little harder than he expected, so he's glad Maggie is up to help walk him through the steps. They're waiting for the water to boil and she hums softly as she stirs occasionally, perfectly at home in the quiet of the kitchen at this hour.

"I can't sleep most nights." He doesn't know why he says it, but it's out there so he can't take it back, so he stares at his shoes. 

Maggie doesn't say anything at first, finally asking, "Nightmares?" 

"Yeah." 

He sneaks a look at her, gnawing at his lip. The Losers knew about his nightmares because they all had them too, but this is the first person he had actually ever told about it. It felt important and momentous, even if it was just Maggie. She's not looking at him though, she's frowning down at the skillet in front of her. "I'm sorry, baby." She looks down at him then, but this time it’s with a watery smile. It's the same kind of look the Losers get, looking at one another while they share their nightmares. "I wish I could sneak in there and fight all your monsters for you." One of her arms wraps him tight around the shoulders and pulls him into her side. "I'll always be here if you need someone to talk to late at night, alright, honey? If I'm not up, you can always wake me up." Her hand makes its way up into his hair and ruffles it again. "Even if you just want me to make you some food."

"Really?" It's times like these that Richie remembers how much he fucking _loves_ his parents. Eddie's mom would catch him up past his ridiculously early bedtime and either cry about how he was rebelling against her or attempt to rush him off to the ER like she thought the only other reason that he might be up is a potential illness. Bill's parents had still been vacant husks of people, present physically but never mentally. He wrote away all his nightmares in an attempt to cope with them alone, like he thought he had to be strong for the whole Losers Club and his parents too. Beverly has admitted her father had hit her the one night he caught her up on the phone with Richie. Mike, Ben, and Stan had good parents, loving enough, but Richie knows he wouldn't trade his parents for anything in the world. And if anyone asked, he was never going to admit that he had tears in his eyes as Maggie ran her fingers through his hair. "Thanks, Mags. I- you-." He gets all choked up now that he's allowed to be the scared kid he's felt too old to be anymore. "I love you."

"I love you too, Richie." They finish the mac and cheese faster than he would ever have on his own and it's amazing, just like it always is. He sleeps better that night than he has in weeks. 

He takes up Maggie's offer at least once a week after that. Most nights she's already up, suffering from her own nightmares, but on the nights that she's not, he taps her awake and they both make a big show of sneaking out of the room to not wake Went, even though he probably wouldn't have woken up if they had crashed some cymbals together - and there are cymbals in the house since Bev convinced Richie to join the band's percussion section with her at the start of sixth grade. 

They make everything twice. The first time, Maggie pulls out a recipe and has Richie gather up her ingredients while she reads it off to him, then she shows him exactly how to do it step by step. It tastes amazing, like always. The next time they're up, she lets him try his best at recreating her dish and helps him whenever he gets stuck. His usually doesn't come out as good as hers, but he steadily gets better as time wears on. 

Went never asks why there's always food in the fridge that wasn't there when he went to bed and he doesn't seem to mind one bit. After Richie's first attempt at cake from scratch, Went takes a bite and announces that it's amazing. Richie is so proud he can't fight down his grin and proudly says that he made it. Maggie looks so fucking proud and Went just grins before demanding that Richie start making more if he's going to be so good at it.

Man, he fucking loves his parents. 

***

By the time Richie is fifteen, he's the unofficial cook for the Losers Club. 

Of course, they don't know that because he never tells them. How could he? It skirts the line of too girly and he's become too aware of how he presents himself since there are still bullies, even with Bowers is locked away in Juniper Hill and the rest of them long dead, that have taken up tormenting him for everything from his glasses to his attraction to men that they can't possibly even know is true. Because it's not. True, that is. It's not. 

It's just Eddie, but who wouldn't be attracted to Eddie? He's still short since the fucker is probably never going to hit a growth spurt, but he's started running on the track team with Ben after their freshman year so now whenever he dons his all too short red shorts, his legs are thick with muscle that makes Richie want to drool. He'd always been skinny, but recently he's become more _lean_ , with _abs_ that show whenever he takes off his shirt at the quarry. Those are also drool worthy, in Richie's humble opinion. Or material for his spank bank. Or both. Probably both. And don't even get him started on his big brown doe eyes. They're absolutely irresistible, whether they're crinkled as he laughs at Richie or lit with a furious fire after someone pisses him off. Richie loves them most, maybe. Or maybe it's Eddie's mouth that's always moving, constantly firing off insults and jokes and ridiculous health statistics faster than anyone else could, just fast enough to keep up with Richie even when the rest of the Losers can't. 

So he is kind of in love with his best friend, so sue him. Anyone who isn't in love with Eddie Kaspbrak is wrong as far as he is concerned. It’s only awkward some of the times, like when he thinks about his thighs while he jerks off or when he finds himself staring at Eddie's mouth just a little too long when they are both jammed into the hammock that is too small for them both but they still make work somehow. That doesn't make him _gay_ or anything. It just means he has taste.

But in order to keep his small slivers of reputation alive, whenever he brings food over to Losers Club outings, he always says it's from his mom. Every single compliment bolsters his ego as a cook though and he starts asking Maggie to teach him harder things to make. He starts helping her during dinner too, although never if one of the Losers is over. Maggie doesn't bring it up in front of them and neither does Went, even though he hasn't told them he's been lying to the Losers. They probably think he's just trying to hang out with his friends or something, but he doesn't read much into it besides being thankful. 

Throughout high school, he gets a lot better at the whole cooking thing. He doesn't need Maggie to sit up with him anymore while he slaves over his meals, but she does anyway, usually with a mug of tea and her crosswords, just to be there if he needs her. Sometimes they talk, but not always. Cooking quickly becomes his escape from his constant non-stop internal dialogue. It feels like it's the only time his brain finally slows down enough to enjoy the silence, but even then, he hates silence and Maggie lets him play some of his mixtapes, as long as there's none of the heavier rock that she's never been a fan of. Because of that, he starts making mixtapes of songs they both like, but he doesn't tell anyone about that. It doesn't seem like a big deal, not really, just like how Maggie didn't think it was a big deal to sacrifice some of her night awake to cook with her son who struggled with insomnia and nightmares since he was eleven. They did things like that for each other, because they were a family, just like the Losers Club. 

He loves his family. Both of them. A lot, actually, despite how often he tries to irritate the piss out of them. In fact, he would even argue that it was _how_ he showed his affections, but both his parents and the Losers would tell him he was just a bit of an asshole. He knows they love him too, though, and that's enough for him. 

***

The day he leaves for college, Richie's one regret is not convincing a single one of the Losers to run away to UCLA with him. He can't wait to get the fuck out of Derry and neither can the rest of them either, but getting away seems almost not as important as the bond the seven of them have forged over the years. There's some nagging voice in the back of his head that keeps telling him not to go, to cling to them harder, to dig his fingernails in tight and not let go. Being across the entire country from them all just doesn't feel right. The guidance counselor at their school told him it was just growing up, that leaving childhood friends and memories behind was the natural flow of life. He never had liked her very much though and it doesn't convince him not to throw away his scholarship to a prestigious school like UCLA to follow Eddie to Eastern Maine Community College in Bangor. 

No, the honor of convincing him not to fuck off and do what he wants instead of what he should do goes to the same person it always had: Eddie. 

Shortly after his fourteenth birthday, Richie had started sleeping at Eddie's once a week. The only people who know he’s there are Eddie, himself, and Maggie - maybe Went, but he never told him himself so he isn’t entirely sure if he actually knows. It's his favorite night of the week, even if Eddie isn't thinking of him the same way he thinks of him. It's one of the only nights he manages to sleep straight through and he quickly becomes addicted to having Eddie within arm's reach. The only reason he doesn't do it more often is because he would probably miss his cooking time with Maggie, not that he would ever tell anyone that. 

Shortly after their high school graduation, Richie crawls through the second story window in the Kaspbrak home, even if he's a bit too wide in the shoulders to still be cramming himself through it and he's a solid six-foot-three after his second growth spurt in their junior year. Eddie is sitting at his desk, reading a book by a lamp like the little nerd he is and Richie tries not to swoon at the sight of his matching pajamas. Without waiting for any greeting from Eddie, he drops his backpack and throws himself into Eddie's bed facedown to hide the deep inhale he takes when he buries his nose into Eddie's pillow. It smells like him and his antiseptic grade body wash, but also cinnamon and oranges. It should smell like some noxious cleaning product, but it doesn't. It smells like Eddie and Richie loves him because he loves everything about Eddie. 

Eddie ignores him until he finishes his paragraph or page or chapter. Richie doesn't really know because he falls asleep with his feet hanging off the edge of the bed, feeling safe because he's with Eddie and damn if Eddie isn't the bravest motherfucker he's ever met in his entire life. If anyone could keep him safe from the freaky fucking sewer clowns and Derry's worst bullies and the nightmares of his own creation, it would be his Eds. 

His wake up call isn't a subtle one. It's a whack of a pillow to the back of the head and then a grumpy, "Get the fuck up, asshole. You better not get your shoes on my bed. And you know how I feel about outside clothes in my bed. Change into pjs or I'll kick you out the fucking window." He can't think of a better thing to wake up to. He wishes he could wake up to it every day. 

"Sure sure, whatever you say, Eds." He grins and his voice is muffled by the pillow, but after another smack against his back, he pushes himself up. "I'm moving, I'm moving! Be gentle, I'm a fragile fuck."

"There's not a damn thing fragile about you, Trashmouth." Eddie says, settling himself under the covers, but it's the same playful banter Richie has thrived off of for the last eleven years. "And don't fucking call me that. You know I hate that."

Puberty had been kind to Eddie, filling him up with muscles in exchange for the height he never got, but it hit Richie like a fucking truck. He changes in the middle of Eddie's room because they've always done that, but he turns his back to Eddie so he doesn't see his ribs poking out right under his skin or his bony arms. It's not really an improvement - now his back acne is on full display, but somehow it's easier than the idea that he might be able to see Eddie looking at his body in disgust. 

As soon as he finishes pulling on his Kaspbrak approved bed appropriate clothes, he slips under the covers with Eddie again and turns on his side to face his friend. Eddie is already facing him and Richie is suddenly very glad that he had pulled the cord on the lamp when he was done reading so his warm flushed face isn't as obvious as it could have been. They don't say anything, both waiting for the other to break the tension. They both know Richie is going to break it, he hates silence after all, but he likes to think that maybe Eddie would break it if he could wait long enough. 

He can't wait long enough though, so he blurts out the first thing he thinks of. "I think I should go to EMaine with you." And fuck if that's not the last thing he wants to say out loud. He knows exactly how this conversation is going to go, which is why he had been putting off saying it at all. Instead, he likes to imagine he could pull off applying to the school without anyone knowing and then just sneak himself into Eddie's tank of a car, an '84 Chevy Caprice that Sonia finally let him get since he would need it for college and he had brought home every safety rating and lifetime statistic that he could to convince her it was safe. Richie didn't know shit about the car other than the fact that Eddie loves the fuck out of it, it can fit the whole Losers Club in it comfortably, and it occasionally spits out black smoke, but Eddie says that’s normal and he knows a lot more about cars than Richie does. 

Eddie's eyes widen comically, like he was going for a bug-eyed Garfield impression. It would be funny if Richie didn’t know that it was about to devolve into an argument quickly "Richie... What about your scholarship?"

"Fuck it." He murmurs back, imploring Eddie to say anything other than what he knows he's going to say. 

"Richie..." Eddie sighs and shakes his head. "You can't do that. You got into a good school. You can't throw that away for me."

_I would throw anything away for you_. He thinks it, but out loud, he goes for something lighter. "But who's going to give Mrs. K her daily dose of Tozier lovin' if I'm gone?"

Eddie snorts. "Beep beep, dipshit. She would murder you if she knew you were here."

"I stopped by her room on the way to yours. I don't think she would." Hiding his hurt with jokes is something he mastered sometime around sophomore year. All the nights staying up, writing his material down really paid off for something, even if it was just to pretend he’s fine to his friends. "Think about it, Eds?" He asks softer, all traces of joking gone from his voice. 

More silence. Man, does he fucking hate the silence. There are so many words or sounds or songs to fill silence with, why would anyone ever want it? If there was ever anything he would judge Stan for, it was liking the silence of midmorning when he watched birds on Saturdays. Fucking nuts. Eddie's hand moves across the bed to grip the front of his shirt. "No, Rich. I'm sorry. You can't do something like that for me. You've always wanted to get out of this town, so fucking do it man. Please." 

He knew it was coming, but it still fucking hurts. He'd give anything not to leave Eddie, but he can't say those kinds of things without announcing his big dirty fucking secret he's been burying since the summer of '89. "Yeah. Sure. Get out of Derry." He laughs, but it's too hollow even in his own ears. "I'm going to get some sleep. Night, Eds." Just so Eddie can't see his face and the tears that are about to fall from his face, he rolls over and chunks his glasses onto the floor before scrubbing at his eyes. 

"Richie..." Eddie scoots closer and wraps an arm around his waist, pressing his face between Richie's shoulder blades. It's how they usually end up sleeping, even if Richie will never in his life admit that he likes to be the little spoon. "Just think about it. You're going to fucking thrive in California. You know that, right? There's a whole new state for you to terrorize with your awful fucking jokes. And you always talk about liking blondes, right?" He does, but it's not true. He's always had more of a penchant for brunettes with big doe eyes. "There's tons of blondes in California. You're going to love it there. It's got everything you've always wanted."

_It doesn't have you, so it doesn't have much._

He sleeps worse than usual for his last month in Derry. He’s up almost every night, stress baking blueberry pies that he won’t even eat. His mom ends up taking most of them to church on Sundays so they stop filling up the counters. On his last night in Derry, he brings his last one over to Eddie’s.

***

The first few days out of Derry fucking suck. He's miserable because he can't fuck off to Eddie's or the Barrens or the clubhouse or the quarry when he's lonely and when he can't sleep, his mom isn't there in the kitchen to cook with him. In fact, there isn't even a kitchen in his dorm, not a real one, and it's not like he'd come with a full kitchen set, so he can't cook at all when the nightmares start up again. They're fuzzier now and they don't make as much sense, something about clowns and maybe a broken arm and sometimes there’s a werewolf, but they still leave him gasping and sweaty around two in the morning. The only good thing about his dorm is that his randomly assigned roommate sleeps about as heavy as Went does, so he's able to get through a work out and some reading before trying to fall asleep again. 

After two weeks, his sleeping is worse than it's ever been in his memory. At least, he thinks. He can't really actually remember a lot before getting to college besides shitty bullies and his loving parents that call him at least once a week. He had some friends and he thinks they were pretty close, but they must've been bored of him by then and vice versa, because he isn't able to dredge up their names and they've never called or anything. It fucking sucks, but he's an adult now so he takes up walking in the middle of the night. It's peaceful, but too quiet in his opinion. It's not as fun as cooking, so he's looking forward to moving out of the dorms and into an apartment so he can start his nighttime routine again. He can't even drink his weird tea that he always wants before bed since they only have two mugs between them and he's too lazy to clean it every day. He doesn’t remember why he started drinking it either, but it feels so much harder to sleep without it, like it’s some important part of his nighttime routine. 

College gets better after freshman year though. He keeps cooking in the middle of the night. His roommates don’t know about it, but they appreciate the food in the fridge that is up for grabs. It feels like he’s reclaiming some small part of his nights that he actually remembers enjoying. It's weird. He has this feeling in the back of his head that it's only ever been his second favorite way to pass the nights, but he can't quite grasp what it was that his favorite way was. Sometimes when he wakes up from his weird fucking nightmares that seem like some unholy clusterfuck of seven people's different fears all rolled into one super nightmare, he gets a clearer image of big brown eyes and short brown hair and an arm around his waist, so he figures it's an ex-girlfriend that he just doesn’t want to remember. Who wants to remember exes anyway?

But then on campus, he starts to realize he's never looking at those traits on girls. He makes shitty jokes about liking blondes to his friends and on his short sets he's allowed to do before the actual acts come on, but whenever he looks for brown eyed brunettes, which he’s certain is his actual type, it's always short men that catch his eye. He doesn't remember much about his high school, but he does remember how much he used to get bullied for being a _fucking queer_ even though he never admitted to being one. He thinks it might be safer here in California, but after years of self preservation in the form of jokes about pussy he doesn't give a shit about, he still can't let it go. So he doesn't say anything, just lets his eyes trail down the legs of a boy in short shorts for probably a little too long and then tells everyone he's too busy getting ass to settle down for a girlfriend. 

His short opening sets turn into longer ones during the actual showtime and then a regular spot at a grungy bar, which turns a regular spot at an actually good comedy club. He gets his degree in philosophy because what the fuck else was he going to study? He might have been good at school but he didn't give a shit about it. He just wanted an easy degree to blow through while his comedy took off. 

Graduation brings along a whole new revelation for him: he can set his own goddamn hours. It's easier to sleep when the sun is out, so he throws himself into late night bit slots and sleeps when he gets home around two in the morning. It helps, if only a little bit at first, but he thinks he's sleeping more than he has since he was ten.

By the time he's twenty-five, he's making decent money off his jokes and actually kind of digging life. Sure, he's lonely, but he's sleeping better than ever. He only wakes up once a week usually now and the nightmares are less scary and more just confusing. Whenever his parents visit though, he wakes up and cooks late at night with Maggie, just for old times sake. He only does it a handful of times a month on his own now and he's really feeling like he's doing well. The only thing that would make it better is some close friends and a boyfriend girlfriend to make his parents happy. 

And then he meets Sandy and she seems perfect. Dark down hair that's cut short because she's a feminist and Richie digs that because he knew some kickass women in his life once upon his time, Maggie included. Big brown eyes that look like melted chocolate that he likes and even if they aren't the same mesmerizing eyes in his dreams that he always swears he would do anything for, they're still pretty. She's a bit of a firecracker, almost even able to keep up with him, all wrapped up in a short package. They have sex and it sucks, but it's sucked with all the girls he's slept with, so he figures its his problem. Not everyone loves sex, right?

After that, it feels like he blinks and then he's thirty-five and he's a fucking _famous_ comedian, which is all he's ever wanted and should be the tits. But it's not because his agent stopped letting him write his own jokes and now he feels more like a puppet than a comedian. He still tells his own jokes at home, but Sandy seems to think they aren't as funny and cute as she used to. He lives with her and he has tons of famous friends and celebrity parties to go to any point in time and he's _still_ fucking lonely. It feels like he's spent his whole life going in reverse and he's chasing some high that he hit in high school that he can't even fucking remember and he's fucking miserable all over again. 

Drugs help. Weed is fucking great and easy to find in LA, but sometimes cocaine can be fun to get him out of the house and to a party. Alcohol is a given, almost every night. It's replaces the weird tea he used to drink, but that's mostly because Sandy made fun of him for that and his vitamins he always took to help him sleep. She gets him into a doctor for prescription sleeping medicine, but he can hardly ever take it since he drinks so often. He takes it anyway on nights he really doesn't want the nightmares to bother him, but there's some voice in the back of his head that nags the fuck out of him when he's doing it, talking about the effects its going to have on his liver and how stupid he was. He assumes the voice is his conscience, even though it sounds like a very specific high pitched male voice instead of his own, and ignores it.

The thing that finally ends their relationship is his cooking though. Not in general, he's a much better cook than her, but the nighttime cooking. Sandy thinks it's weird and tells him to just go to bed or read a book like a normal person, but she doesn't seem to get that he's not a normal person and never has been. He's a fuck up in every sense of the word, but sleeping is the thing he's absolutely the worst at. 

It's all very dramatic, he's sure, the yelling back and forth at three am while he makes blueberry pie because the nagging conscience voice from his memories had clearly said _Blueberry pie is my favorite!_ in a chirpy voice that filled him with a warmth in his chest he's not sure he's ever felt before. He's not actually sure if he was yelling back, he’s a bit high, but it ends up with Sandy screaming she can't take it anymore and she packs a bag and leaves right then. He supposes he should feel sad and in the end, he does cry, but it's because after making the pie, he remembers he doesn't even like it and neither does his mom. He doesn’t even know why he knows how to make it in the first place, but he does realize that he’s made one after every one of his worst nightmares. He’s not sure what to make of that either.

Surprisingly, or unsurprisingly depending on who was asked, Richie gets a little happier without Sandy around. He's not less lonely, but not really more than before either. When he tells Maggie, she hops on a flight to LA and stays for a week. They spend almost the whole time cooking and she puts so much food in his freezer, he's pretty sure he wouldn't need to cook for a month. He’s going to anyway, but he doesn’t need to. He feels like a kid, being coddled by Maggie again just like all those years ago when she first started teaching him to cook, but it's not completely unwelcome. It reminds him he used to be happy and maybe he could find it again, one day. 

That day isn't the next day though. Or next month. Or even next year. It happens when he's pushing forty and he gets a phone call from a Derry number he doesn't recognize and hears Mike Hanlon's voice for the first time in twenty years. All those years with an aching yearning in his heart for his family suddenly make sense when he _remembers_ his second family, the Losers. When he remembers Eddie, he's a little pissed at himself for ever forgetting him in the first place. How the fuck could anyone forget Eddie Kaspbrak? 

After years of time flying by and being okay with it, the second he gets to Derry and lays eyes on his friends, all he wants it for it to slow down. But it doesn't. Stan doesn't show up because he's in the hospital for a suicide attempt and Richie blames himself for not being there all those years when his friend needed him. Then Bowers shows up and stabs Mike, who ends up in the hospital too, before he stabs Eddie in the face, which was his big mistake. Everyone knew that Eddie fought tooth and nail to win in everything he did, just like he did with Bowers, who ended up dead on his hotel room floor. Then they're back in the sewers and he's holding Eddie's hand as they go through the winding tunnels and then he has to watch as the fucking clown spider fucking demon from his nightmares bites Eddie's arm off. He's not even sure how they finish the fight because he's running on so much adrenaline, but he carries Eddie out of the sewers and straight to the hospital, where he ends up right next to Mike. 

Beverly tries to get him to leave the hospital once the doctors tell them that Eddie's in stable condition, but he can't. He let Eddie slip through his fingers once, all those years ago, and he'll be damned if he lets it happen again. They bring him a change of clothes and food, taking shifts at the hospital like they have to babysit him instead of worrying about Eddie. Well, they kind of do because he only eats when they tell him to, but could anyone blame him?

Around the third day of Eddie in a medically induced coma that he should be waking up from any second now, he decides he'll tell him. As soon as he wakes up and is lucid, he's going to tell him he loved him more than anything else in the world and still loves him even after twenty-years not remembering him. He'll tell him that he looked for him in every girl he tried to date but no one was ever good enough because they weren't Eddie. Fuck, he'll tell him anything he wants to know, if only Eddie would open his fucking eyes. 

He doesn't get the chance to though. Eddie wakes up and he's groggy for the first hour, still drugged just enough, but as soon as the fog clears from in front of his eyes, he grabs Richie by the front of his shirt and pulls him into a kiss that's more blunt force trauma to his lips than a real kiss, but it's the best thing that's ever fucking happened to him. After half a beat, Eddie shoves him away just as aggressively as he had pulled him in and Richie is pretty sure his lip is busted from the way it smarts, but he can't stop smiling. 

***

Richie still has nightmares post clown killing round two. They all do, almost as bad as they did as kids all over again. It sucks massive dick because they're scary again since his memory stayed perfectly intact even after he left Derry again, but they're all there for each other this time around. He still doesn't feel like he can tell them about his late night hobby, even if they already know he's gay, still wary of how much Sandy used to make fun of him for him, but he still calls all of them late at night to have someone to talk to while he cooks. 

The only person he doesn't call is Eddie because that would be weird since he was asleep in Richie's bed. He sleeps like the dead thanks to the pain medication he's on and he might be the only one of them that actually sleeps through the night. Richie hasn't even told him of his hobby yet. He's not avoiding it per say, but it hasn't come up yet. Eddie doesn't notice that their fridge keeps magically filling itself every night or if he has, he doesn't seem to think it's strange. Richie chalks it up to the drugs. 

It's a month and a half of cohabitating with Eddie before he finds out. Richie is up cooking because he woke up after hearing Pennywise hiss _don't touch boys, Richie, or everyone will know you’re a fucking fag_ over and over while his brain played the moment Eddie's arm was ripped off in front of him and he was covered in his blood on loop for what felt like hours. It's one of the worst nightmares he's had since they left Derry and it left him shaken to his core, so he's baking a pie and making mac and cheese. He's still missing chunks of his memories, they all are, so he can only remember the reason he makes mac and cheese is because it's the first thing his mom ever taught him to cook. He's never understood the pie, but their memories have all slowly been returning to them, so he figures he'll remember eventually. 

No one answers his text in their group chat about being awake, but the silence of his apartment feels more suffocating than usual, so he throws his Spotify playlist on shuffle. The music helps his nerves, but not as much as hearing a Losers' voice would have. It does, however, make it impossible for him to hear the footsteps creaking up the steps of their downstairs bedroom. 

"Richie?" Eddie yawns halfway through his name and it's fucking adorable, but it also scares the shit out of him and he nearly jumps out of his skin before relaxing when he realizes it's just his boyfriend. His short angry adorable boyfriend. Eddie Spaghetti, his _boyfriend_. He says it a lot and Eddie pretends to be annoyed about it, but he knows he loves hearing it every bit as much as Richie loves saying it. "What are you doing up here?" 

Richie turns and sees Eddie rubbing at his eyes with his good hand. It's his only hand, but Richie makes that joke a lot since Eddie keeps laughing at it. He's got on boxers and one of Richie's old tour shirts and it's too big for him because it's been stretched out by Richie's broad shoulders, so it hangs off Eddie. He looks so adorable that Richie doesn't even register he asked a question until Eddie levels him with an annoyed glare. 

"Hey asshole, I asked what you were doing. Are you cooking?" He sounds so cute. Everything he does is cute in Richie's head though.

He looks back down at his skillet and frowns. Eddie isn't Sandy and he knows that, but a sick stone of dread still weighs down in his gut. "Oh uh. Yeah, I'm cooking."

"At-," Eddie pauses and Richie figures he's looking around for a clock. He’s been complaining about not being able to wear a watch anymore since he only ever wore it on his left wrist just about every day since he got released from the hospital. "-Three-twenty-seven in the morning?"

"Yeah. I cook when I can't sleep. Well, I cook a lot, but mostly when I can't sleep." He's sweating again and cursing Went's genetics for giving him nervous sweats. _Please don't yell at me. I can't handle it, not from you._

Eddie doesn't say anything and Richie doesn't turn around, too nervous about what he might see on his boyfriend's face. His favorite Wombats song is playing in the background. It's an ironic soundtrack to the tense moment and he desperately hopes that whatever happens doesn't ruin the song for him like so many others were ruined by arguments with Sandy. But then he hears the scrap a chair being dragged across the floor and Eddie's _hmph_ as he plops himself down right next to Richie. "What are you cooking?" He asks sleepily. 

Richie finally risks a look at him. He doesn't look mad or irritated, just half awake. "Um, mac and cheese." 

"Gross." Now he looks disgusted and Richie remembers with a start that Eddie despises mac and cheese after that summer when they were ten and it was all he ate for a month. The new memory slots itself into place and he huffs out a soft laugh at the absurdity of it. 

"Well, don't worry. I'm making a pie too." He chuckles, ruffling Eddie's hair. It reminds him of cooking with his mom once he got good at it, how she would just sit up with him in case he needed to talk. 

"Oh it better be blueberry." Eddie murmurs, eyes closing as he leans into Richie’s touch. "Blueberry pie is my favorite."

_Sonia actually let Eddie out for a sleepover at Richie's house in their sophomore year of high school. Well, she let him out for a sleepover of Bill's, but what she didn't know wouldn't hurt her. The specifics didn't really matter to Richie. All that mattered to him was that Eddie was sleeping over at his house and he had a surprise._

_He and Maggie couldn't sleep the night before, so they baked a blueberry pie from scratch to kill the time. It was his first attempt at pie. Neither of them even liked pie, but Went did and he was sure that Eddie would too since he had the biggest sweet tooth of anyone Richie had ever met. He was excited for Eddie to try it. It didn't matter that he was still lying and saying Maggie baked it on her own. It was enough to hear Eddie's praises, even if he didn't know he was complimenting Richie._

_"Do you want some pie? Mags made it last night." He asks on their way to the kitchen for a midnight snack._

_He could practically see Eddie's mouth watering. "I can’t even remember the last time I ate pie. That sounds amazing."_

_Richie pulled out the batch of mac and cheese he'd cooked three nights ago out of the fridge first. Eddie's nose wrinkled at the sight, but he licked his lips when he saw the pie come out next. "Voila!" Richie gestured to them with a flourish, swinging his arm out as if to present them. "Mags cooking is the best in the world and we both know it."_

_"You can say that again. The chicken she sent you over with last week was amazing." Eddie hopped up onto the counter while Richie scooped them both out their food onto a plate and then threw the slice of pie in the microwave. His chest swelled with pride at the indirect compliment._

_He hated silence normally, but it was different with Eddie kicking his feet while he eagerly awaited his slice of pie to come out of the microwave. He basked in silences like those, probably because just having Eddie in his vicinity made everything a solid five hundred percent better. The ding of the microwave caught him off-guard. He'd been distracted staring at Eddie's calves, something he had been doing more often than he cared to admit. "Here you go, my Eddie Spaghetti." He handed off the plate with a bow that Eddie snorted at._

_"Fuck off, Richie. That's not my name." No matter how many times he said it, Richie was still convinced he secretly liked his nicknames. Especially since, when they were alone, he always said it softly with a fond look on his face. Eddie accepted the plate and immediately shoved a bite in his mouth, moaning like it's the best thing he's ever tasted. "Oh my god, this is amazing."_

_"Really?" Richie turned back to the microwave to throw his mac and cheese in, hiding the grin that stretched across his lips._

_"Yes, holy shit." He heard his fork scrape against the plate and then again shortly after. Eddie must have been shoveling the bites into his mouth by the sound of it. Before Richie managed to finish typing in his time for his mac and cheese, Eddie asked, "Can I have another piece?"_

_Richie snorted. "Sure, Eds."_

_Three slices of pie later, they laid down side by side on Richie's bed to listen to a mixtape Richie made for Eddie but he chickened out of giving to him after realizing how many love songs he crammed on there. Eddie rubbed his full stomach and proclaimed unprompted, "Blueberry pie is my favorite."_

_Turning on his side to look at Eddie, Richie chuckled then and made some dumb joke about him getting as fat as his mom, but he committed that knowledge to memory. He would make a thousand blueberry pies if it made Eddie happy._

The memory hit Richie like a punch to the gut and he chokes back tears. "Richie? You okay?" Eddie asks.

Of course it’s Eddie. It’s always Eddie for him, isn't it? 

"Yeah, I'm fine." Richie wraps his arm around Eddie's shoulders and pulls him into a hug, burying his nose into his hair. "That's not true. I'm not fine. I'm a fucking wreck because I just realized that for the last twenty years, I've been making blueberry fucking pies whenever I'm stressed out."

"Okay? What's wrong with that? Blueberry pie is arguably the best dessert ever. Your mom makes a great one, so yours should probably be decent at least." Eddie leans into him, confused. 

Richie can't help but laugh before releasing Eddie and stirring the pot in front of him. "I don't even like blueberry pie, Eds."

"What? Then why do you make it? That’s fucking weird, man."

"For you. I always made them for you, Eddie Spaghetti." 

Eddie peers up at him with his eyes narrowed. "Either I'm still too asleep to follow this conversation or you're not making a lot of sense."

"My mom never made any of those pies in high school. I did. I started cooking with Mags in the middle of the night when I couldn't sleep. The night after I made my first pie, you told me blueberry pie was your favorite and I've been making it every night when I'm stressed out and I never even knew why because I don't even like pie." 

"Wow." He shrugs. "You must really like me or something." 

Richie just bared one of his deepest secrets to Eddie and he has the nerve to seem unimpressed. What an asshole. "Nah. I fucking love you. Always have."

"Good thing I love you too, for some reason." Eddie grins up at him before wrapping a hand around the back of his neck and pulling him into a sweet kiss. When he pulls back, Richie rests his forehead against Eddie’s and they stay like that, staring into each other’s eyes. “I really do, Rich. Love you, I mean. I always have.”

He felt his eyes tear up and decides that’s enough emotions to deal with for one night. Morning? Whichever. “Alright, alright. That’s enough out of you. Be mean to me or something so I don’t cry.”

“You mean I could’ve made you cry years ago and all I had to do was be a little nice to you? Weak.” Eddie chuckles and Richie does too. 

“Fuck you, man. It’s not every day the love of your life for the last thirty or so years is all mushy. It’s allowed.”

“Whatever.” He rolls his eyes and gives Richie a playful shove. "Now when can I eat that pie?"

**Author's Note:**

> Catch me on Tumblr at [SRaye96](https://sraye96.tumblr.com/) or on twitter at [Raye96s](https://twitter.com/Raye96S)


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